


Sparks

by sunalso



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Soulmates, Sparks, a hint of Huntingbird, netflix and no chill, research labratory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-19
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-09-18 18:42:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20317690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunalso/pseuds/sunalso
Summary: AU. Jemma is a top researcher in the field of Soulmate biology but needs a better way to collect the sparks that fly around Soulmates. She could also use a lot more samples. Fitz might be able to help with both.Beta'd by Gort.





	Sparks

Jemma liked fireworks.

They were fun, in a combustible kind of way, and she enjoyed watching from them from a healthy distance.

It was much the same with the sparks that flared between newly found soulmates. She was fascinated. They were all light, with no ability to burn anything, but the chemical and biological structures necessary for the phenomenon to exist were complex in a way that she hadn’t entirely figured out, even after two degrees.

It was not an easy thing to study, as there was no way to predict where or when soulmates would find each other, and the secondary light shows that occasionally happened when soulmates were intimate with each other were also not something that was usually shared in a research setting.

However, Jemma had discovered the sub-cutaneous structures that contained the biologic material released during the light shows, though the discovery had presented more questions than it had answered because the sparks weren’t randomly colored, they corresponded to the eye color of your soulmate.

Nobody had ever reported it being inaccurate.

Jemma and her team had created a way to test yourself to see what your soulmate’s eye color was. The kits weren’t cheap, but the demand for them supplied her entire lab with funding.

It was also how she knew her soulmate had blue eyes.

With her brown eyes, she knew there was another person somewhere in the world who had golden sparks waiting under their skin. Waiting for her. Not everyone had a soulmate, less than half the world’s population at any given moment, but she did.

It was such an intimate thing to know their eye color.

Jemma had stopped dating after discovering that. And she made a point of taking the hand of every blue-eyed person she met so she didn’t risk missing her chance to find her soulmate.

Because even though she was relentlessly logical, there was a part of her heart that longed to get to know who the universe thought was her perfect match. She wanted to fall in love, and she wanted to be loved. She wanted every stupid line of poetry, even the old Greek ones that mentioned Apollo’s blessing, to mean something to her.

She wanted to see someone light up because she touched them.

Jemma had no doubt all her friends and colleagues would be surprised at how romantic she could be. Maybe they’d be a little less surprised if they could see her right now. It was late, but she was still tucked in her office and crying over the end of a Netflix movie she was watching on her mobile. It was a rom-com about a bodyguard who learned the woman he was protecting was his soulmate when he tackles her to save her during a shootout. It was hilarious because there were (CGI) sparks going everywhere while they were trying to hide.

It was all tender at the end, but not sad, Jemma was just certain she’d never know how it felt to look into someone’s eyes and feel sparks go off. The odds were certainly against her.

Her office was immaculate, with framed pictures of magnified subcutaneous Simmons’ Structures—they’d been named after her, much to her embarrassment—on the otherwise white walls. A few plants soaked in the London sunlight from a view of the city she rarely got to see as she often worked in the lab from before sunrise until after it set.

Jemma nearly fell out of her chair when a knock sounded at her door, and she hastily rubbed at her eyes as a man poked his head into her office.

“Hello?” he asked, sounding both uncertain and very Scottish. It was not one of her employees, which meant he shouldn’t have been able to get in.

“Can I help you?” she said, standing. The overhead lights were off, both in her office and the lab proper, and she couldn’t make him out beyond a vague outline. She grabbed her mobile, just in case the man had nefarious purposes, but somehow turned the volume up instead, and the end of the movie played loudly for a few seconds before she managed to silence it. “Sorry,” Jemma mumbled.

“Was that _To Serve and To Spark_?” the man asked.

“Er, yes.”

“I rather like that one, funny and sweet.”

“Me too.” She didn’t know what else to say as a complete stranger now knew more about her entertainment choices than people she considered close friends. Jemma cleared her throat. “Who are you? And how did you get in my lab?”

“Sorry! Sorry. I’m Dr. Leopold Fitz.”

It took her a minute. “Yes, of course, you’re the drone guy.”

“That’s me. Call me Fitz.”

She’d had a back and forth e-mail conversation with him and had sent him several boxes of the special agar she’d developed to help him with a post-doc fellowship he was completing. “I thought you were going to be here tomorrow? At eleven?” They had a meeting scheduled so he could show her the drones. It was partly a job interview as she was considering hiring him on as a much-needed engineer for her team. If the drones worked to collect the bio-sparks, she’d have a lot more material to work with because people shagging were far more amenable to automatic drones collecting material than lab-coat wearing scientists.

“I am. But I don’t think the hotel I’m at is secure enough to store my two prototype sets.” He gestured at the lab behind him. “The security guard downstairs said you were working late and could show me where to store them?”

“Of course. Yes.” Jemma walked into the lab and flipped on a few lights as Fitz hurried towards the two cases he’d left on a workbench. “Two sets?” she called after him.

He turned towards her and did a double-take. It wasn’t something she’d thought real people did. His light-colored eyes—she couldn’t tell exactly what color they were from halfway across the room— widened.

There was a clench low down in Jemma’s abdomen, followed by a surge of heat.

Oh dear.

She’d seen his boyish picture with its wide smile when she’d researched him after he’d first contacted her, but that picture hadn’t even hinted at the man standing in her lab. His light brown hair had a slight curl to it and hung over his forehead sweetly. His shoulders filled out his plaid short-sleeve button-up shirt, and his scruffy, strong-featured face with its slightly pouty lower lip made her want to tackle him.

This was entirely inconvenient. Jemma couldn’t hire someone she wanted to jump five minutes after she first met them.

His long-fingered hands twitched, and she wanted to grab his wrist and shove his hand between her legs.

She was so wet her knickers were clinging to her.

Fitz frantically grabbed at his shirt and pulled it out of his waistband, then turned around. “There’s two, because, um…there’s two…for the initial sparks and for s-s-sexual congress.” His voice was hoarse. The growled syllables made her nipples tighten into uncomfortable peaks.

What was wrong with her?

Much more of this and she was going to swoon. The room felt too hot as it was.

A tiny part of her brain gave the rest of her a kick. She was experiencing sudden, intense sexual attraction.

Fitz reached the cases, and his hand went to his crotch. She realized he was adjusting his prick. Jemma whimpered and bit her lip.

The tiny bit of brain kicked again. Jemma knew this. Knew… “Fitz,” she said, bolting across the room until she was close to his back. Close enough to smell him, and her nose seemed extra sensitive as she could pick up notes of his deodorant and body wash. It was woodsy and mixed with what had to be his musk. “What color are your eyes?”

_Blue. Say blue. _

Fitz made an incoherent reply, then turned around. The tails of his shirt were doing a terrible job concealing how the front of his trousers tented out.

Jemma managed to look up, meeting the bluest eyes she’d ever seen.

It felt like her heart stopped beating for long seconds before kicking into overdrive.

Fitz reached out a hand, stopping just shy of her hip. “Can I?” he asked. She nodded, unable to speak as she kept her gaze locked to him. His warm hand landed on her hip, and she gasped. His fingers brushed upwards and inched under her blouse until the tip of one landed on bare skin.

A warm wave of bliss rushed across her skin from that one point of contact.

Fitz inhaled deeply. “Jemma,” he rumbled.

She shakily reached for him as tendrils of bright gold light flickered over the line of his jaw. It was beautiful. He was beautiful.

Her soulmate.

There was an explosion of blue and then gold sparks beside his ear.

“Fitz,” she said. “Sparks!” His brows drew together as Jemma turned to the table next to them and cursed. She hauled open a drawer and frantically searched for a prepped petri dish. She might never get this chance again.

There was a soft hum, and Fitz gently took her arm. “I got it,” he said. Eight small drones zipped around them, targeting the bursts of gold and blue. A shy smile, edged with gold light, spread over his face as she gaped.

“The drones are fully functional?” she asked.

Fitz nodded, and Jemma gave up on not launching herself into his arms. They closed snugly around her as if they’d been waiting for her to be in them for forever.

Her lips crashed into Fitz’s, and they quickly found the right angle. He tasted of juicy fruit gum, and she sank her tongue into his mouth, searching for it. But he must have spit it out before introducing himself because even though she brushed her tongue over every bit of his tongue, teeth, and gums, she couldn’t find it.

Little noises of enjoyment kept escaping from Fitz. Jemma, as a researcher of this phenomenon, tried to catalog her body’s responses, from the incredible endorphin rush to the tiny bursts of pleasure from her sparks at last being set free.

Fitz kissed down her jaw to her neck, and her head fell back. She watched the light show of mingled gold and blue sparks, hardly believing it was coming from her and Fitz.

Her soulmate.

One of the drones buzzed near her and paused to catch a sample.

“Fitz, these are brilliant. You’re brilliant.” She sank her hands into his thick hair and straightened up, he glanced up at her, and his grin matched the one in his photo now.

“Not as brilliant as you. Everyone thinks you’re going to get a Nobel Prize.”

“I don’t.” She’d identified glands, very small, very difficult to identify glands that had required the development of new methods of tissue staining, but it wasn’t the same as inventing a new branch of math or the like. 

“I do.” Fitz pushed an errant bit of her hair behind her ear, and his expression was earnest. “I’ve had to go through every bit of your work to get the drones to function, and it’s all groundbreaking.”

“And you took it and gave it wings.”

Fitz blushed and looked down.

The sparks were decreasing, having done their job, and the drones were returning to their case.

Jemma’s fingers skittered down Fitz’s arm. “Do you want to go to dinner?” she asked. “I suppose we should get to know each other.” This man was going to be the most important person in her life. She should know his favorite color and food. Did he take his tea with sugar or perhaps honey?

Her fingers skittered down his arm, and a trail of light exploded in the wake of her touch.

Fitz moaned, and the sound went straight to her core. Her earlier lustiness returned tenfold. Fitz caught her hips and pulled them towards him, and she could feel the hard line of his erection pushing eagerly against her.

“I want to go to dinner,” he said, his eyes drifting closed while a faint bloom of light played up his neck and over his face. “I want to know everything about you, absolutely everything, though I can’t imagine I’ll ever know enough. But--” He broke off, panting.

Jemma rested her hands on his shoulders, marveling at the rising blue sparks tinkling over her skin. “Do you have another proposal?”

“Yes,” he said earnestly. “We use the second set of drones for sample collection.”

The second set, which were made for collecting sparks during intercourse. Her toes curled. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard anything sexier in my entire life. Do feel free to open the case.”

Fitz’s hands were shaking, and it took him several tries to undo the latch and press the buttons to activate the drones. Jemma used the time to strip, hesitating only a moment before her bra and panties joined the pile of her sensible work attire.

“There,” Fitz grunted as the drones rose from their case. He turned around and squeaked, one hand over his mouth. She would have thought he wasn’t happy with what he saw, but his cock jerked and throbbed in his trousers in a very reassuring way.

After a second of looking lost, he started yanking at his shirt with one hand and pulling at his belt with the other. He managed to kick his shoes off and get his belt undone before he tried to pull both his shirts off at the same time. He cursed as he struggled, and Jemma bit her lip to keep from giggling, even as lines of faint blue sparks ran up her belly, over her breasts, and to her nipples.

One of the little drones flew close to collect a sample. “Aren’t you cute,” Jemma said, petting it with a finger. The little thing’s motor purred.

“Are you talking to my drone?” Fitz asked. He’d gotten the shirts off, though his hair was now a tangled mess. He had his hands on his zip and was undoing it.

“Yes, though I think you’re cute too.”

He blushed again, but his fingers moved faster. He pushed his trousers and pants down and kicked them off.

Her eyes zeroed in on his bobbing erection. Under her gaze, light shot down it and a small mist of golden sparks briefly appeared. “That’s never happened before,” Fitz said, looking down.

“I should hope it hasn’t.”

Fitz flashed her a cheeky grin. “There a light show going on with your cu..uh, pussy.”

“You can say cunt.”

“Oh, thank god.”

She laughed and closed the space between them. Her hand landed on Fitz’s belly, her blue lights mixing with his gold as she slid her palm over him.

His gaze traveled up and down her, but his hands landed right on her breasts, which set off bright showers of sparks.

“You like that?” he asked, sound more like he was asking for an opinion on cucumber sandwiches than an intimate touch.

“Yes.” She pushed forward into his hands, and another blue spark firework show erupted as he plucked at her nipples.

A couple of the drones darted in to collect samples, but they were gone in seconds as Jemma molded herself to Fitz. He kissed her again, his hands sliding down her back to her ass.

“This is a big deal,” she said.

“I know. My last first time.”

“And mine.” Something warm settled deep in her chest that had nothing to do with the sparks around them. She nuzzled against his throat and mouthed his adam’s apple. “I should probably mention you’re hired.”

“Huh?”

“The demonstration that’s really an interview tomorrow?”

He grunted a response that sounded like an affirmative.

“No longer needed. Your drones are fantastic, and I want you on my team. Soulmates hunting down the biological secrets of what makes people soulmates.”

“Dr. Simmons,” he said. “I do believe you’re a romantic.”

“Not usually, but someone developing a deep connection with someone who was previously just a name on a computer screen really brings it out in me.”

Fitz chuckled, with made his cock twitch against her, and she very nearly came. She gasped, loudly, and blue rippled over her skin in a wave.

“Jemma?” he asked.

“I need you. And you’re a romantic too if you’re watching the same movies on Netflix I am.”

“A fair cop, that.” He craned his neck and looked around.

“Anywhere. Now,” she said. “On the floor, the counter, against the wall.”

“I more looking for—” he shook his head and muttered something to himself. “Right. You’re not going to have a convenient dispensing machine. I don’t have a condom. It’s not like I flitter about England routinely fucking primary investigators on major research projects.”

“Bloody hell, I don’t have one either. I’m always so prepared, but I never imagined--” She took a deep breath. “We’ll simply do non-penetrative acts. I can assure you I do not have any communicable diseases.”

“I haven’t had sex in…I didn’t have my doctorate yet,” he said sheepishly. “I’m clean unless I picked up something from the taxi I rode in earlier.”

Jemma laughed again. She was going to fall so in love with this man. How was it possible she hadn’t known him less than an hour ago? How had she drawn breath when they weren’t sharing the same air?

“What do you want to do?” she asked, reaching for him.

“I have so many ideas.” Fitz grinned at her. “But I get to go first.”

Jemma was left breathless as Fitz grabbed her ass and lifted her onto a workbench behind her. He pushed her legs apart and sank to his knees. His fingers skimmed over her pussy, leaving her breathless while blue sparks danced in the air.

“Fitz,” she gasped, not quite believing that the first thing he wanted to do sexually with her was taste her.

“I said I wanted dinner.” His voice caught as he leaned forward and licked her. His tongue was warm and soft, and a single swipe over her pussy left her a mess. There was a light show over her thighs and between her legs.

Jemma whimpered and her hips bucked. She was so close already. The table was hard under her ass, but she didn’t care as Fitz loudly feasted on her. It was very impressive that she could generate so much light and sparks. She’d not been aware exactly how much work the Simmons’ Glands were capable of in such a short period of time. Four of the drones darted in and out of her sparks, merrily collecting their samples.

Fitz’s fingers were glowing gold and emitting tiny showers of sparks as they gripped her thighs. There was a tingle to it, and to his tongue, that drove her wild. She rode his face, humping shamelessly against his tongue. Rather forward of her, she supposed, when she most of what she knew about him was a list of past academic accomplishments.

One of the drones buzzed by her face.

She knew he was an extraordinary engineer.

Fitz slid a finger into her. The tingling of his sparks deep inside, combined with how he was pressing against her inner walls and licking her clit sent her catapulting into an intense orgasm. She keened as her legs trembled, and her body erupted with pleasure.

“Holy shit,” Fitz whispered from between her thighs.

She cracked open her eyes, gaping herself at the light show bursting from her skin. Fitz’s face was edged with a warm, gold glow, but she wanted to see what would happen when he came. Jemma tugged him to his feet and kissed him again, treasuring the tang of her desire that his lips and tongue carried.

Her fingers curled around his sides and directed him to turn, so he was leaning against the workbench. With a last suck at his lower lip, she lowered herself to her knees.

“I don’t think you’ll have to be down there long,” Fitz said, his hand tangling in her hair.

She inspected his cock, long and thick, while tiny bursts of sparks erupted from it. She could have done a lot worse when it came to the prick she’d be playing with for the rest of her life.

Precum had beaded on the tip, and she licked it off, setting off another round of sparks while Fitz groaned. He tasted male and salty. It made her want more.

“I like your cock,” she said, looking up at him.

“Oh, good.” He clumsily patted her head.

Smiling to herself, she wrapped her hand around his shaft and sucked the head between her lips, humming her delight.

Fitz made a strangled noise, and his cock swelled even harder. He hadn’t been lying about it not taking long. It made her chest warm. Her soulmate liked how she looked, and tasted, and seemed to have immediately accepted any and all aspects of her. It was everything she’d dreamed of and also more because she rather liked all of him. His body that set her alight and his sharp mind that had not only understood her research but was able to apply it.

He was meant to be her partner. The light under her skin had always known that and had been waiting to be set free.

Fitz moaned, and his hips jerked, driving his prick deep into the back of her throat. She nearly choked. Jemma grabbed his hips and pinned them against the edge of the table as she pulled her mouth off him.

“Stay still,” she snapped. Fitz instantly froze, except for a small whimper from his lips and a throb from his cock. She glanced up at him again. “Or I might have to tie you up.”

Small explosions of sparks erupted from his skin as a slight shudder passed through him. “Promise?” he asked.

“I’m buying restraints as soon as we’re done.”

His cock jerked, sparked, and a line of precum dripped from the tip. Jemma didn’t need any other response to know they shared a kink. She licked along his prick and sucked it between her lips again. She kept her eyes open, watch the play of lights from her hands and arms and his skin.

“Jemma,” Fitz whispered a few minutes later. “Jemma…I’m—” She could feel his body tensing and appreciated the warning. He came with a hip twitch, growl, and an absolutely stunning light display that radiated out from his groin to his, finger, toes, and top of his head.

Jemma felt oddly proud. She’d done that to him. Lit him up. Made him come.

The rush of come in her mouth required her to swallow it noisily. The taste had a hint of sweetness to it like he’d been eating fruit.

The drones were still active, a few rushing in to gather sparks that came from her as well as Fitz’s.

She finally released his cock and stood. With a happy coo, he gathered her into his arms while the sparks faded away and the drones settle back down.

She kept her eyes on them and the wealth of research data each one contained.

“They don’t have to be processed immediately,” Fitz said as if he could read her mind. “There’s a forty-eight hour window.” His hand caressed her back.

“That’s good,” she replied. “For the first time in my life, I want to wait.”

“Dinner?” Fitz asked, voice hopeful.

“Let’s just go back to my place and order pizza.”

He cupped her face. “Jemma, you truly are brilliant.”

#

Bobbi arrived at the lab the next morning yawning and not looking forward to a day of number rehashing or calling soulmates and begging them for the possibility of sample collection.

Oh, and there was the engineer coming in with a drone design.

She walked into a hubbub of whirring laboratory equipment and excited researchers.

Something big had happened.

Bobbi found Jemma standing beside a bench with sixteen little things--drones? Where those drones?-- on it, resting in neat holders. She was excitedly talking a mile a minute with a man on the cuter side of British. They were talking over each other, cutting each other off, and apparently only making sense to themselves. The man had a Scottish accent that rendered what he was saying even less intelligible, though Jemma didn’t seem to have a problem.

“Is this the drone guy?” Bobbi asked Jemma, who finally noticed she was standing there.

“Yes, Fitz,” Jemma said. “He’s engineering head now.” Jemma pointed at Bobbi, who was very confused. “This is Bobbi Morse, she’s biology head, and obviously didn’t get my text to be here early today.”

“No.” Bobbi frowned at the bustling lab. “What did I miss? Weren’t we supposed to hear about these drones in a maybe interview at eleven?”

Jemma shrugged. “Fitz brought them in last night.”

“Wait, they’re operational?”

Fitz appeared offended. “Of course, I wouldn’t bloody bring a half-assed project to present to one of the most preeminent minds in the world.”

Bobbi gaped. What was she, chopped liver? Who did this guy think he was? She prepared to tell him off, only she caught sight of his fingers brush Jemma’s. Two little puffs of light and sparks erupted, one blue and one gold.

That explained a lot.

“Jemma,” Bobbi said instead. “We have samples. A lot of samples. Want to tell me where those came from?”

Both Jemma and Fitz’s bright red blushes were very satisfying. Bobbi should have registered Fitz’s blue eyes earlier, and that Jemma would never have put up with a man talking with her like that about anything if she didn’t really like him.

Bobbi raised a brow. “I’m assuming you two will be able to continue providing samples?”

Fitz made a face and rubbed at his temples. “You need to meet my mate. You’re as bad as him.”

“What color are his eyes?”

“Brown.”

“I’ll meet him. If he puts up with you, he must be a saint.”

“Hunter’s far from—”

Jemma stepped between them. “Sample analysis.” She made a shooing motion at Bobbi, who rolled her eyes before heading to her office to drop her things off and grab her lab coat.

She was happy for Jemma, who’d been so often alone while working on a project dedicated to people who were destined for each other. And watching movies about soulmates finding each other—Jemma didn’t know Bobbi knew about those— and reading soulmate romance novels…Jemma deserved her happy ending.

Bobbi was only a little jealous. Unlike her friend, she’d always been certain someday she’d make somebody spark.

And she had a good feeling it was going to happen soon.


End file.
